Former Liverpool and Southampton striker Rickie Lambert is off to an auspicious start with new club West Bromwich Albion.
Lambert, a lifelong Liverpool fan who spent just one year with the club, was signed away by West Brom after a disappointing 2014-2015 season.
A few hours later, Lambert bagged a brace against Bristol Rovers (another former Lambert team) in 56 minutes of work with his new club, which led to great jokes on Twitter.
Drogba lands in Montreal
Everyone's likely already heard that Didier Drogba has signed with the Montreal Impact, a team that recently put up a second place result in the CONCACAF Champion's League. While the rumors were originally for Chicago, Montreal was able to steal him away with a combination of targeted allocation money — they backed the Brink's truck up to Drogba's front door — and location — Montreal being a French speaking town.
Louis van Gaal has been having immense fun with the world’s media this off-season. Last week he told a throng of salivating journalists that he had a “surprise” signing in the pipeline, leading all and sundry to waste copious amounts of ink/cloud space pontificating about said surprise's identity.
There’s been no action on the pitch since mid-May in the English Premier League. However, us enthusiasts out there have been able to keep our sanity in large part due to a plethora of transfer rumors, 90% of which never actually come through – your Bale-to-United’s and Benzema-to-Arsenal’s of the world. However, the 10% that do materialize make you question everything you once knew about the game.
The temptation to believe that Karim Benzema will leave Real Madrid is at an all time high. As the team continues its preseason exhibition tour in China, the French international has posted a photo to Instagram of himself in a plane separate from the rest of the team, with the caption “let’s leave the past in the past.”
While he’s yet to dot his two I’s, it’s as certain as low wages at Walmart that Angel di Maria will sign a contract with Paris St Germain in the coming days. Less than 12 months after shelling out a British record £59.7 million for the Argentine Champions League winner, Manchester United are expected to agree to a fee of around £45 million that will see the former Real Madrid midfielder cross the English Channel.
Zlatan Ibrahimovic says what he feels all of the time, and a lot of the time that involves letting someone know that he is better than them.
When asked who he thought was the best looking woman in the world, he responded, “I don’t know, but when I find her I will date her.”
He’s arrogant, there is no getting around that, but hearing his ignorance it is hard to not think of a famous Muhammad Ali quote: it’s not bragging if you can back it up.
Real Madrid is stuck in a sticky spot after they let longtime goalkeeper Iker Casillas go on to Porto after 25 years with the club. To replace him Real Madrid is looking to make a deal for Manchester United keeper David De Gea, but it looks like the Red Devils won’t be willing to let him go without Sergio Ramos in exchange.
A solemn farewell to Casillas leaves backup keeper Jesus Navas, who is also Costa Rica’s first choice keeper. He had a great World Cup, but had a dismal first season for Real Madrid.
It’s been a tumultuous few months for Javier Hernandez. At the turn of the year, Chicharito was on bench-warming duties at the Santiago Bernabau, seemingly unwanted by both his new employers in the Spanish capital as well as his paymasters back in Manchester.
Thomas Muller has been one of the key players behind Bayern Munich’s success in recent years, as well as the German National Team which won the last World Cup in 2014.